WALNUT ISLAND, N.C. (WVEC) — Tropical Storm Michael has come and gone, but people on Walnut Island, North Carolina are still cleaning up from the storm.
Many said they prepared for Hurricane Florence a few weeks ago, but they didn’t think they needed to prepare for this storm.
“This time we didn’t think nothing of it,” said a resident.
Many people who live near the Currituck Sound thought Tropical Storm Michael would bring minor flooding but didn’t expect it to be a huge deal.
“I didn’t see a reason to prepare. It wasn’t forecasted to be a big storm,” said Jason Letourneau.
He said although he wasn’t worried at first, he did have a plan to tell if the water was getting higher than he expected.
“I tried to go to sleep last night with a foot dangling off the bed so that I could feel it like it would wake me up,” Letourneau said. “As soon as I realized the water was taking over the house, it was instant panic. I jumped out of bed and tried to salvage anything I could.”
Many of his belongings couldn’t be saved.
“We lost the bed. We lost a bunch of toys, vacuum cleaners, washer and dryer. The toilet is being pulled. The sink is being pulled,” Letourneau said.
On Friday, Letourneau picked up the pieces and is trying to move forward. He said he’s thankful, and said it could have been worse.
“All we can really do now is pull the nails, dry the boards and put it back together and don’t buy anything too nice, because it’s going to get wet again,” he said.
Letourneau said his goal is to have everything back to normal in the next two to three weeks.